I've been scared...

just a stream of consciousness...

I haven’t posted an article in a minute because I haven’t felt like I have anything worth to write about. I've gone through multiple topics in my head, started a few writing pieces and none have felt strong enough to stick. I’ve been so hard on myself in trying to find something that people will like to read, then I remembered some wise words from a book written by Rick Rubin titled ‘The Creative Act: A Way of Being’ where he states;

“If you think, “I don’t like it but someone else will”, you are not making art for yourself. You’ve found yourself in the business of commerce”. He goes onto say “the more formulaic your creation is, the more it hugs the shore of what’s been popular, the less like art it’s likely to be”. The most important part of the paragraph I am quoting is the following sentence; ‘There is no more valid metric to predict what someone else might enjoy than us liking it ourselves’.

Remembering that I can write what I like without the concern of other people liking it or not, ignited the same flame I had at the beginning of this public journal. I think many of us, especially as creatives - need to hear this once in a while. We need to be reminded to not hold onto external validation and to just produce what we want to produce and how we want to produce it. That is a level of authenticity that I believe is very crucial in the creation process, shutting out the outside noise and focusing on what feels good for your Soul. Because at the end of the day, the Souls purpose is to express what feels real and through using whatever medium or practice aligns.

The one thing that always gets in the way of this for me is my exposure to social media. I have had a very hard time with social media since the beginning of 2021. As absurd as this is going to sound, it just felt like my mind wasn’t safe when I was on there. I was very susceptible to comparing myself to other people, what they’re doing, what they have, who they’re with etc. and this took a really deep toll on my mental health. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I deleted my instagram account for 4 years after that. Looking back now, I can acknowledge that I probably wasn’t mature and strong headed enough to filter out the noise and to curate my algorithm into a healthy space. However, I learnt a lot about myself and the internet as a whole in those 4 years. The most important thing I learnt was that none of what’s on there is real… to a certain extent. This epiphany desensitised me (for healthy reasons) to a lot of content that people post. I stopped taking social media so seriously because I realised that everybody on there has a role to play. So I built up mental forcefields as means to protect myself.

After those 4 years, I created an instagram account and ensured that it was a safe space for myself. My forcefield looks like not caring about my follower count - I have 178 ‘followers’, a smol community of people that I more or less know personally. This makes me feel like I don’t have a thousand eyes on me that are watching everything I do. I post whatever I want - myself, my art, my interests, stuff that align with my way of thinking and beliefs. But most importantly - I make sure that I am having fun and not taking my platform seriously. Whenever I feel like I’m not having a good time, I take what I call ‘hiatus’s’ where I deactivate my account for however long I want. My friends dislike this so much about me because one day I'm online and then the next, my account simply doesn’t exist… you need to catch me when you can lol. Anyway I say this to say, I have found ways to make my socials a safe space for myself and I use it as a means of self expression. As a creative, I need exposure therapy and social media is that for me. I would love to disappear into the ether and leave no trace of my existence but I have a calling, and my calling demands that I be seen. So I’m pushing through my fears and putting as much of myself as I can, out there. Without ruminating about whether or not people will like what I have to share.

It’s a journey, fear still clouds my mind sometimes, paralyses me and convinces me to keep quiet but I’m aware of how dangerous that is in the process of creation. I don’t hold my fear as something precious, I let her go so she can see that we’re safe.